How in the world can it be August? Summer 2025 is flying by and all of the staff at FFP are all busy. There are days when we have too many guide trips and not enough people to cover the shop. It is a whirlwind, which is fun, and I am thankful for the good business, but it makes the days go by awfully fast.
I told you I had a second hook in a body part story to share, so here it is (followed by the fishing conditions report).
In the summer of 1988 I was already 2 seasons in to working at the Fly Box in Bend asa retail employee, and 1988 was my debut to guiding. Alan was the boss at the shop, and Craig Lacy owned the guide permits on the Deschutes National Forest and Lower Deschutes (BLM) licenses that we worked under. They agreed that at my young age I had the skills and passion to start guiding, but they set the following rules for their new teenaged guide. #1, I was only allowed to guide the Fall River and Hosmer Lake, and #2, the clients had to drive (including taking me to the guide trip).
On this summer day it was to be my first ever lake trip. I had an older client who I knew from the shop named Joe from Santa Rosa, and his son in-law Scott from Portland.
We drove to Hosmer in Joe’s Blue Volvo 240 Station Wagon with 3 Float Tubes, Fins, Waders, Vests and a cooler with lunches and drinks. Those cars were so cool, and actually fishing assault vehicles.
It was Scott’s first day float tubing, and he was also a new fly angler so I began the day with a lot of time helping him, leaving Joe to kick towards the channel, letting him know I would catch up to him as soon as I could. Once Scott was doing well enough with his fishing, I told him I’d catch up with Joe and we’d all rendezvous for lunch in an hour or so.
When we kicked back to the boat ramp to take a break from the tubing and to share some lunch, Scott tells me he “had a little problem”. I asked what that might be, and his 6’6″ body turns his back to my 5’6″ skinny teenaged body and he points out to me that a #6 Royal Coachman Bucktail is buried in the cartridge of his ear.
Hey, I am trained in First Aid Scott, let me take a look. It’s barbless right? The last thing he said to me was that he forgot to pinch the barb, and just as I reached up to touch it to see what I might do to help Scott, he passed out cold and went down in a heap in the parking lot. In the fall he cracked open his forehead in so now I have a client with a large and kind of rusty old barbed hook stuck in his ear, and blood gushing from above his eyebrows. We quickly loaded Scott and fishing gear in the back of the Volvo and headed to the ER in Bend.
The doctors did a super job getting the hook out of Scott’s ear, placed a bandage on his forehead and gave him a tetanus shot. When Scott and Joe emerged from the ER to see their young guide in the waiting room, I told them the day was still young and full of the best piscatorial hopes the 3 of us could dream of, and that we should spend the rest of this fine summer day at the Fall River. Unbelievably, they agreed to the offer and we ended up having a good afternoon and evening on the Fall!
Joe was a good customer for years after that, following my path from the Fly Box to The Fly Fisher’s Place and supporting me until he was too old to fish.
There are many lessons from this old story, not withstanding pinching your barbs. But staying positive and being prepared are 2 things all guides and all anglers need to do.

Yesterday we had a guy come back to the store who was wild eyed and excited and oh so appreciative of last weeks fly recommendations on the Metolius River Report. He beamed with his story of 9 trout landed on the caddis we recommended on the report.
Last night I texted my friend and customer Bobo (he’s usually the guy on the rover searching the river for something he dropped, or limping back to the truck after falling over something HAHAHA) to see how he liked his new Korkers boots (he did) and he told me he’s been having good success on the Golden Stones in the Upper River. It’s a great time for Golden’s all month so make sure to fish a Clarks or Norm Woods over the next weeks!
PMD’s are out all over the River from the Headwaters area to well below Bridge 99. It is a staple summer hatch and one you want to make sure your boxes are covered for the nymphs, emergers, cripples, duns and rusty spinners.
Blue Wing Olives are a common hatch in August and get better throughout the month. Usually we see these little olive mayflies later afternoon and early evening and a #20 or even #22 is a good hook match for this hatch now. Same idea to have the nymphs, emergers, cripples, duns and spinners for the BWO’s.
August is a great caddis hatch month and besides the #16 tan caddis that are common on nearly every western river and stream, look for #16 to 18 olive caddis (Iris, CDC and Hemingway) and any day now we will see an explosion of yellow micro caddis that are a #20 (maybe 18). The fish love this hatch, mostly because of how strong it is there is a lot to eat.
Midges #20-22 and Yellow Sally’s #16 and a #14 Olive Haze are a few other dry flies to carry this week.
This is a topic that comes up in the shop often enough I want to say something again about it here, in a river like the Metolius fluorocarbon tippet on the dry fly rig is not your friend. It sinks in the film and adds micro drag to the drift. Micro drag is a no good killer of what appears from your end to be a good presentation. From the trouts sightline, it stinks. Micro drag stinks. Use a nylon tippet on the dry flies in tricky currents like the Metolius.
To note, I use fluorocarbon tippet for dries in lakes, and usually even use it on the Fall River. But the Met has currents designed by the Devil himself and it’s hard enough to get a good drift when everything is all perfect.
When you nymph or streamer fish here, the fluorocarbon has advantages. Stronger test, better wet knot strength, more abrasion resistance and way more invisible.
So when you are running nymphs like Caddis Pupa, Jig Napoleon, Frenchie, Walts Worm, Olive and Purple Perdigons, Zebra Midges, Micro Mayflies (PMD and BWO) 2 Bit Hookers, Golden Stones, Green Drake Jig Nymphs, Twenty Incher and Soft Hackle Pheasant Tail, utilize fluorocarbon tippets in 4x, 5x and 6x for the best results.
There are some really nice Bull Trout in the River now and for the most part we’d chase them with a big streamer on the swing, possibly stripped too in some of the pools. Dead Drifting streamers under an indicator or on a tight line nymph rig is good in some quarters too. Read your waters and choose how to approach it by what you see and what you feel.

The Lower Deschutes morning and evening to dusk fishing are the best times to be in the river with the best opportunities for good success, including on dry flies such as Tan Caddis #16, Grey Caddis #18, PMD’s #16, and Pale Evening Duns #14. Rusty Spinners #16 will be good for the eddies in the evening, often it will be the last fly of the day, but choose wisely between these and an Iris Caddis or Fin Fetcher Caddis because some nights the fish will be on the mayfly’s and other nights eating the caddis.
Make Sure you have X Caddis and Purple Haze too.
Nymphing with Caddis Pupa, Red Ass Soft Hackle, Peacock Girdle Bugs, Perdigons, PT’s, Micro May’s and Brown Mini Gulps (looks like a crayfish!)
Mid Day fishing is a mixed experience , some days the nymph action remains constant, and other days it is a grind. Some days you’ll even find some good dry fly action in shallow riffles and more so in eddies even mid afternoon. Look for the shady eddies to have more of that, but that is not hard and fast by any means.

The Middle Deschutes from Bend to Lake Billy Chinook has many good access points and is worth your time here from dawn to noon and after dinner to dark any day you choose this month.
Euro nymphing, indicator fishing, dry dropper techniques, dry flies as attractors and match the hatch moments on Caddis, PMD, Pale Evening Dun, Blue Wing Olive and Yellow Sally’s. I’d pound a couple of banks with a grasshopper in a few areas too.

The Fall River was pretty good this week for the most part, and I had a nice report of a good sized wild brown caught there too. The big browns are like a unicorn, but they are around for patient fly fisher’s who put the fly in the right place at the right time.
Depending on the time of the day you go you may fish streamers almost any time, or jig nymphs on a euro rig, or a dry fly attractor or be matching the hatch of the moment which is my favorite on any river. Hatches you will see include PMD’s #16, BWO #18-20, Yellow Sally #16, Olive Stones #16, Rusty Spinners #16-18. Add some Ants, Beetles, Hippie Stompers, Hoppers and Red PMX and give the Hippie Stompers and the PMX some skittering to induce a few strikes. It’s funny, down in Argentina the guides want us to skitter everything, but how infrequently we skitter any trout dry flies here is interesting.

The Crooked River after saying we hadn’t seen a lot of dry fly action mid-day, I got a few reports of the contrary saying my goodness we hit afternoon PMD hatches that every fish in the river wanted to eat! So, keep it in mind that you sure as heck could run into some PMD’s any day you’re out there too.
Nymphing a Split Case PMD, Micro Mayfly PMD and a Brown Jig Napoleon is good, and of course we all love a Fire Starter Jig and Zebra Midges, Tan Caddis Pupa, Lightning Bugs and Scuds here. Caddis hatches after dinner are good, and get some X Caddis and Kellers Caddis for the hatch and an Upright Rusty Spinner and Purple Haze for dusky times before you’re done for the day.

Small Waters- The Headwaters of the Upper Deschutes, the Upper North Fork of the Santiam, Marion Creek, Tumalo Creek, the tiny creek that comes out of Three Creek Lake, Whychus Creek above the irrigation diversion are all good summer spots to fish terrestrials, attractors, dry-droppers with a small perdigon and psycho prince. This is a good time of year to enjoy summer water like these places offer. Get off the beaten path and try a new place. Bring your light rod and accept the fun of a 5 inch Brook Trout. Realize the beauty of their skin, and look at them like a rare piece of jewelry. Other places may offer you the gift of a native redband trout. Yes, it might be 8 inches but that is not the point. The point is you are here by your self, and that fish just ate a renegade you waited too long to apply dry fly shake and it sank a little and bam, fish on.

Lakes Report-

I was lucky to be at Little Lava and Hosmer this week and will report on that more, I am headed back to East Lake for the 1st time since returning from Argentina 6 days ago. I can’t wait to be back on East! I heard good things from friends who were there this week.

Hosmer Lake was good to us yesterday with most fish coming to the net on 2 flies. #1 was my Jiggy Damsel under an Indicator in the morning, and the rest of the day a Callibaetis Cate under the indicator was our top fly by far. There was almost no hatch whatsoever ! Weird to me as August is often a great month to see callibaetis in the morning on the upper lake. There were a lot of Damsel Adults around and a few leaping trout chasing them here and there, but not enough for me to switch over to the adults away from the nymphs that were working so well.
The upper lake water temps are mid 50’s. That’s healthy. Watch Lower lakes temps and quit there once it goes over 67. Invest in a water thermometer like the Fishpond Digital one or the Cling Stick-On (your net) and be serious about fish conservation.

Speaking of fish conservation, Crane Prairie has some places temps are safe, and others no. And won’t be for another couple of weeks. Fish are being caught and some days it’s pretty good in the Cultus and Quinn areas. Leeches and Chironomids under an indicator, and Damsel Nymphs on slow sinking lines are good.

Little Lava Lake was also a no dry fly day for Sean and I this week. That was a total surprise and while it was also a disappointment, we didn’t lack any fish to the net using nymphs.
For the most part we caught the majority of the total for the day on Callibaetis Cates. Some on a Spicy Squirrel and some on a Poxy Back Callibaetis. Later in the day it was apparent the more shallow water nymphing had ended and I had a hunch we’d get more bites going to the deeper areas and anchored in 16 feet (about as deep as we can find on Little Lava) and built a deep water nymph rig with a slip indicator and used a Red Worm on the bottom set at 15′ and a Cate 2 feet above that. Most of the fish we landed on this set up came on the Blood Worm.
Hopefully the next time we are there the hatch will be better, or at least the fish will eat some ants and beetles like they usually do.

East Lake is fishing well and on most days you can expect a good late morning callibaetis hatch that may extend to mid afternoon in different stages of the hatch. Also the evening hatch is really good by the white slide.
Ants, Beetles, Hoppers, Blue Chubby and Adult Damsels are good on the top too.
If you are there early in the morning it is likely that the fish are going to be taking small midges at the surface. 6x tippet and #18 or 20 Griffiths Gnat ought to fool a few…..
Deep Water nymphing in 15 to 30 feet of water with Chironomids, including Red Blood Worms is good. In water 15 to 18 feet I like a slip strike indicator on a chassis leader and 2 chironomids tied on my tippet spread about 24″ apart.
Balanced Leeches, Callibaetis, Red PT, Red Holographic Jig, Damsel Nymphs (including shoreline action) and Scuds will be good nymphs to cycle through each day.

Paulina Lake is also fishing really well and ought to be a top lake choice over the next few weeks or longer, especially with Beetles and Ants, Hoppers, Chubby’s, Red Tarantula and a morning session of Callibaetis hatches near Little Crater mostly.
Chironomids, Balanced Leeches, Red 2 Bit Hooker, Scuds, Balanced or Jig Minnow under the indicator and leeches and callibaetis nymphs stripped on various sinking lines.
I heard form my good friend Tim that he and Rich did the shoreline patrol with beetles with good success, but what they finally tried after reading about it on the report and taking Phil Rowley’s seminar earlier this Summer was the Deep Dangle. Rich had a Type 5 and made that work (it just takes longer to Vertical than a Type 7 or 8) and caught a great big rainbow on a leech.

Three Creek Lake is good and the evening bite on Midges, Callibaetis and Black X Caddis is pretty thrilling. You can do well wading the banks or going out in a tube or boat. No motors.
During the day look for fish on Ants and Beetles, Red Hippie Stompers and stripping, wind drifting or kick trolling a Damsel Nymphs, Wooly Bugger, Vampire Leech, Sheep Creek, Flashback PT, Soft Hackle, Callibaetis Nymph or go under the indicator with a Cate, Chartreuse Beaded Leather Tail Balanced Leech(!) Red or Black Ice Cream Cone, Hanging with my Chromies, Red PT and a Jig Lightning Bug.
You should see a mid day or late morning callibaetis hatch occurring on most days. If not, you have all the nymphs as a back up and wait until evening for the hatch or fish the terrestrials and hippie stompers and make them want to eat a dry fly.

Thank you for reading my reports each week and thank you for letting us know that you appreciate the info and the stories, or that it helped you do better on the water. That is what is important and why the effort goes in to each of these.

Jeff